GoldFinger1969

On 7/11/2022 at 10:43 AM, RWB said:

Pattern pieces are not coins and never were.

Right, but the 1907 UHR is a pattern even though they made a small number which were distributed and it was pretty much the final version before becoming the MCMVII High Relief.  These are also patterns but usually only 1 copy and no distribution and they didn't become the model for an actual released coin like the MCMVII HR).

They're closer to experimental models or die experimentations in a way.

And of course, some lone bidder makes ME look moronic by bidding $6K and winning the coin for a total of $6,750. 

https://www.greatcollections.com/Coin/1144362/1923-D-Saint-Gaudens-Gold-Double-Eagle-NGC-MS-66-OH

It's a NICE coin, I just think the price is too high.

On 7/10/2022 at 11:11 PM, Cat Bath said:

Simpson had the best overall set I've ever seen.

Do you mean online or in-person somewhere ?

On 7/4/2022 at 2:21 AM, Cat Bath said:

They are giving Eliasburg credit for the 33 & we know Elite has one. The only other coins are the patterns. (Elite still private for obvious reasons)  See my curiosity? Possible candidates??? Judd 1776 PR Judd 1778 PR  Judd 1778

Judd 1779 PR

I must have missed that:  so they gave Eliasburg credit for the 1933 Saint.  But how did they score it not knowing the grade ?  Maybe default to an MS-65 where most of the survivors tended to be ?

I have to look at those patterns, but the fact that no "coins" were distrubuted as with the 1907 Ultra High Relief makes these almost experimental patterns.  Do we even have the population numbers for these "patterns" ?  I'm sure it's in RWB's book but these patterns are so rare and since not widely struck/distributed you almost consider them like a 1st Draft or something on the way to the final Saint-Gaudens Double Eagle product.

On 7/11/2022 at 7:09 AM, JT2 said:

Whew so that was over now i come to this thing that i  hadnt been paying much attention too the big fat "+" sign.  When on gods green earth did we start with full on onslot of + signs.  Everytime i turned around well it is a  Plus ... heres your Plus sign...   When did this money grab hit us full on?  I mean when i firsts started we had  UNc, BU, Gem BU.. then we started with the 60, 63, 65.  nothing ever got past a 65 unless she was really special and i mean like wife special.  now we have 61, 62, 64, 66, 67......  if i keep taking about this they may star implemting half grades.. oh that is a 64 1/2 + * yadd yadda yadda............  

Nice review, hope you enjoyed the show, JT. 

But regardless of grading quirks today, I believe we are light-years better than the days of UNC, BU, Choice BU, Gem BU, etc.

On 7/10/2022 at 8:46 PM, MarkFeld said:

That occurs far from “Only on eBay usually”. Many sellers have coins listed at what appear to be (or are) very aggressive prices. Among other reasons, it can be due to greed, expectations that would-be buyers will counter-offer (regardless of what pice the item is listed at), a superior quality example, trying to break even, after having paid more than current market value or expectation of rising prices.

Good points, Mark.

I tried to negotiate with someone who had a nice 5 ounce silver commemorative that I wanted.  Prices were about $250-$350 going back over a year or so.  This guy wanted $600 for his coin.  I kept raising my offer close to $375 but he never countered.

Coin was still there months later.

On 7/10/2022 at 9:11 PM, Coinbuf said:

There are thousands and thousands of coins worth $50 (or less) in TPG slabs, value before and after slabbing is important but only one of the considerations.

I guess many of them -- if slabbed when prices were higher -- would have holders from 1989-1994, right ?

On 7/10/2022 at 7:32 PM, World Colonial said:

How many are there now?  10MM? $20MM?  The table below only goes to 1988.  Hard as it is to save $1MM, it isn't even close to rich.  Summary of millionaire materials (oregonstate.edu)

I have a link somewhere I'll look for, but if you go by total net worth (including primary residence equity) I'm going to say it's close to 20 MM households.  Liquid financial assets, probably 10 MM.

I could be off, I'll circle back......

On 7/10/2022 at 7:32 PM, World Colonial said:

That's what my mom told me, but she might be wrong.  I didn't confirm in the county records.  But keep in mind, it was a 4BR house which now has 4000+ SQFT of living space with a finished basement and then maybe close to 3000.  It was large for its day. 

Yeah, the houses on Long Island and the NY/NJ suburbs were closer to 1,200 - 2,000 square feet.  I think the house I grew up in was 1,800 (49' High Ranch).

On 7/10/2022 at 7:32 PM, World Colonial said:

My grandfather wasn't rich but one of the "working rich" per your definition at the time.  Nothing left of the family money on our side though.  On another note, when Ferdinand Lundberg published "The Rich and the Superrich" in 1964, there were about 60,000 millionaires which was rich at the time.

How many are there now?  10MM? $20MM?  The table below only goes to 1988.  Hard as it is to save $1MM, it isn't even close to rich. Summary of millionaire materials (oregonstate.edu)

Yeah, I don't know if millionaire would mean EARNS $1 MM...or has a net worth of $1 MM (including homes)...or a liquid financial net worth or easily-liquidated assets that comfortably exceeds $1 MM even if given a haircut.

You could also include PENSIONS which are worth millions for many public sector employees (and some private sector) if they are young enough and get a certain annuity for life.

I estimate the value of many teacher, firemen, and police pensions in New York State as worth about $1.5 MM - $2.5 MM.  Some as high as $5 MM !!

On 7/10/2022 at 6:44 PM, Nutmeg Coin said:

Only on ebay usually.  At those prices you may have what is called a "spam" listing.

Yup....I get asking a high percentage over market for a low-priced item.  I see silver commemoratives that should be $200 and someone asks for $350 and hopes someone needs it right now for a birthday, Christmas, etc.

But there's a huge difference in paying a few hundred bucks (or less) over market and paying THOUSANDS over market....for an item that is plentiful and always available.

On 7/10/2022 at 6:44 PM, Nutmeg Coin said:

I looked at it and the seller must have insisted on it since GC encourages much lower starting bids to have the market bring it up.

That also makes sense.

Look at this 1923-D Saint-Gaudens in what looks like an early or mid-1990's holder.

https://www.greatcollections.com/Coin/1144362/1923-D-Saint-Gaudens-Gold-Double-Eagle-NGC-MS-66-OH

1923-D's in MS-66 sell for about $4,500 to $5,000 depending on the quality (assuming no CAC).  Why would someone ask for $1,000 - $1,500 over market (esp. a starting bid) ?  I mean, I know you can always get lucky but anybody buying a Saint-Gaudens coin generally and for this much money specifically is not likely to be uninformed.

This coin has been out there a few weeks at least, maybe months.  I've seen others getting no bids that were listed for OVER a year.

Why do it ?

On 7/6/2022 at 2:33 PM, World Colonial said:

As usual, I was the only "naysayer", even though this includes everything I collect.  Another example of me providing specific arguments and evidence contradicting (implied) financial hyperbole while everyone else writes in the abstract to disagree with me.

I don't recall seeing that thread but I would have been alongside you.  Also, others who agreed with you might have thought that you said it better than they could and thus didn't post.

If a thread disappears due to inactivity, I wouldn't assume others agreed or disagreed with the posts or others.  They may have missed it like I did or they may have thought they couldn't improve on anything you said/typed. 

On 7/10/2022 at 1:58 PM, zadok said:

...ive been heavily invested in oil/gas for decades actually still am, ditto tobacco n mining, but never bought any enron but one my 401k's did n doubled down n lost their butts, i just never liked their business style much preferred royal dutch...did exceptionally well in the fracking part still reaping residuals...did well on those storage tankers during the storage sparcity but u had to get in n get out at the right time for those, fortunately i gauged it correctly....

I owned RDS before....the European/British oils are too henpecked by the Greens overseas.  Both RDS and BP cut their dividends in 2020....Exxon and Chevron did not.

Royal Dutch had last cut the divvy almost 80 years ago during WW II during The Blitz.  They threw that all away.

On 7/10/2022 at 11:34 AM, World Colonial said:

I gave you the example of commercial real estate but let me draw an analogy with my grandparent's prior house, located on one of the best streets in Buckhead in ATL.  Built in 1940, they sold it in 1962 for $60K or so I was told.  It sold this year for about $1.1MM with 1.2 acres instead of the original six, long ago subdivided. 

Wow....$60,000 for any home in 1962 -- let alone Atlanta area or Georgia -- was damn pricey.  Homes in the NY area when my parents and relatives bought in the LATE 1960's were only $30,000 or so.

On 7/10/2022 at 11:53 AM, EagleRJO said:

I'm in NY, just outside NY City

Do you attend any of the surburban NYC-area shows:  Westchester.....Mt. Kisco....Parsippany ?  There's also some on Long Island but I've never gone.

On 7/10/2022 at 11:45 AM, EagleRJO said:

Thanks for the suggestions.  How about places/events where I can find raw coins that have not been graded/slabbed yet?  And what about rolls of older coins I sometimes see for sale on eBay, although I find it hard to believe someone hasn't already searched through the rolls to look for very valuable ones and then re-rolled the remaining common ones.  

Local, regional, and the national coin shows.  Where do you live ?

On 7/9/2022 at 1:46 PM, zadok said:

...does that mean i should sell or hold my enron?....

Never forget that Enron was a legit company...had real assets....the fraud hit years later once they spun off the tangible, real assets into what is today EOG Resources, a leading E&P fracker/oil/gas company.

EOG stands for Enron Oil & Gas (or at least used to). 

On 7/9/2022 at 9:29 PM, World Colonial said:

First, gold had a big run up to August 7, 2020 ($2072).  Someone might claim it was in anticipation of something but whatever.  The point is, it already rose a lot (from March) and it was (and is) very expensive historically (and has been for a long time) versus the things that people need and want to buy, especially other commodities.  While I think (and attribute) this consistently high price to a higher risk premium, in no way is it remotely "cheap".  So, given this historical relative valuation and run-up, why would anyone think it unusual?

No disagreement.....I would call gold "fairly valued" myself and certainly LESS OVERVALUED than cryptos, certain stock market sectors, and other non-liquid assets (art, high-end real estate).  But all assets, including those that are the playthings of the super-rich, tend to have some price inelasticity to them.

Let's see how they all handle quantitative tightenting and a Fed Fund rate closer to 4% from the conditions of the last 14 years. 

On 7/9/2022 at 9:29 PM, World Colonial said:

Second, gold isn't an inflation hedge like "metal bugs" claim.  It's entirely dependent upon when you bought it.  If you bought it in 1980, you're both underwater and had a huge opportunity cost.  Same story for 2011 but just less.  OTOH, if you bought in 1999/2001 or October 2008, you're up big.  My explanation for it?  Simple, people aren't robots but human beings, they have agency, and can act contrary to the expectations of "metal bugs". Nothing hard to understand about it.

Gold was the ONLY way to hedge or diversify in the 1970's as inflation soared.  That's why gold did well and new-trading in currencies (and falling Treasury bond prices) made the trading volumes more or less the same.  Today, currencies (and Treasury bond trading) dwarf gold.

On 7/9/2022 at 9:03 PM, World Colonial said:

So, what I am telling you is that there aren't (or weren't) 735 billionaires in 2021 versus 13 in 1982 because the country is that much richer.  It isn't primarily because of inflation either.  It's substantially or primarily because assets that used to be worth relatively nominal amounts in the past now sell for ridiculously inflated prices, like professional sports teams or commercial real estate.

No doubt general and asset price inflation impacts billionaire totals and other income/wealth levels.

But there is also REAL income/wealth growth, particularly from U.S. dominance of certain key export sectors where we can not only sell to Americans but service the global community.

The net worths of folks around in both 1982 and today certainly outstrips inflation and even stock market returns for many.

On 7/9/2022 at 8:51 PM, World Colonial said:

As for GFC, I never heard that coin prices fell that much but I have never seen specific data or researched it myself.  I heard that it was more stagnation and persistent than a "crash", once again depending upon coin or series.  Some series like classic commemoratives have (mostly) been on a one-way trip lower, in this case since the end of the TPG bubble.

We had a 12-year decline from 2008 into 2020....then once Americans had all that extra $$$ apparently thgy bought many coins in the index (silver and gold also rose, too).

https://www.pcgs.com/prices/coin-index/pcgs3000

Still WAY down from 1989 and even 2008 highs.

On 7/9/2022 at 11:02 AM, Quintus Arrius said:

Such a one has yet to respond here in support of his highly speculative, wildly fluctuating participation which @GoldFinger1969 aptly refuses to call an "investment" or "currency."  I caught a good 40 minutes of the broadcast listening to three professional women who, regrettably for me, spoke in terms I did not upstand in a cool, call and collected manner. None of the listeners who called in seemed to be upset or agitated. What am I missing here?

BARRON'S -- which is not given to scams -- has had some good interviews and panel discussions on crypto and BitCoin the last few months.  There is PROBABLY a place for it -- but whether that place is with BTC at $5,000 or $50,000 or $500,000 I have no freakin' idea.

When you have an "expert" on crypto/BTC from a respected Wall Street firm which doesn't need to plug them....that's more credible....these crypto or digital brokers who are 100% invested and immersed in crypto have an obvious bias.

I want to see a guy who made his $$$ the hard way -- Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Ray Dalio, Steve Cohen, David Tepper, a Walton family member, etc. -- put a nice chunk of their net worth into crypto/BTC.  Until then......

On 7/9/2022 at 9:05 AM, zadok said:

...WC whats ur reccommendation i do with my time share i just bought for the metaverse?...also, cant seem to locate its gps coords on google search, hmmmm?....

I'm waiting for holodecks like in Star Trek:  TNG. 

On 6/22/2022 at 9:09 AM, The Neophyte Numismatist said:

What do you think future economy plays into coin prices and how could future economic conditions play into coin scarcity itself? 

I don't think that the minting of modern coins -- gold, silver, or otherwise -- will be impacted by any economic circumstances.  That's something that is pretty constant, I would think...we're always minting new currency.

OTOH.....demand for numismatics and bullion will be impacted by any negative wealth effect that hits the middle-class, the upper middle class, and the so-called "working rich."  These are all distinct from the truly wealthy and ultra-HNW types who are worth hundreds of millions or billions and aren't impacted by a 20% or 40% drop in the stock market, falling bond prices, or even real estate drops. 

The folks who earn $50,000 to $500,000 are big buyers of coins, bullion, numismatics, and commemoratives. Even the working rich -- the small business owner worth $5 MM or $10 MM or even $20 MM -- who buy with large discretionary sums will be impacted by a drop in stock/bond prices.

A guy like Bob Simpson or those like him will be unaffected.  The folks who login to HA or GC and/or goto a LCS or a regional or national coin show will feel the pinch and cut back.

Comparisons to previous times are pretty much useless as the 1970's were a unique time period (e.g., floating currencies in 1973, gold price no longer fixed, inflation, etc.) as my trading volumes post above shows.  You also had some unique variables as people got caught up in 2 bubbles in 1980 and 1989 in the last 40 years.  A perfect confluence of events and circumstances -- gold going up 20-fold in 10 years, silver going up 40-fold in 10 years, inflation, floating currencies, Doom & Gloom types dominating via TV and newsletters with no financial information available like today -- led to great mispricing of numismatic assets.  "Get Rich Quick" schemes with coins and bullion were everywhere from outright scamsters to legit commentators using hyperbole to grab "shelf space" like Howard Ruff's "Ruff Times" newsletter.

Still happens today....but on a MUCH smaller scale.

On 6/22/2022 at 12:48 PM, The Neophyte Numismatist said:

Gold in general has been pretty interesting to watch.  Many collectors and experts have considered gold to be a hedge against inflation.  Also, some people think in terms of gold as a counterbalance to a sinking equity portfolio.  In 2009, gold soared in economic uncertainty.  Today, we have record inflation, economic uncertainty, a war in Europe... and while gold has made some gains, is not behaving quite like we would expect.

Gold and the foreign exchange market traded $1 billion daily in 1980.  Today, gold trades $50 billion a day.....and foreign currencies (led by the dollar) trade $5 TRILLION a day.  That's where folks go during times of economic stress and uncertainty....to the dollar generally, more specifically, U.S. Treasuries.

On 7/8/2022 at 10:02 PM, Quintus Arrius said:

Some eight months after crypto peaked, it reportedly crashed in a spectacular meltdown: $2 TRILLION DOLLARS, a virtual market wipeout.

I think the losses are about $1 trillion, but point made.

On 7/8/2022 at 10:02 PM, Quintus Arrius said:

An SEC official in the former administration, speaking privately, and a spokeswoman for "Web 3," whatever that may be, spoke for one hour with a moderator, neither side conceding anything but both agreeing "regulation" was needed. One listener who readily conceded he had lost "a ton of money," made vague references to a Ponzi-like scheme and another leapt on Elon Musk's recent announcement [to 80 million Twitter followers] that his comment that this crypto ecosystem was "bad for the environment" resulting in a 15% loss of value was actionable suggesting he ought to be brought up on criminal charges.

Web 3 is the next version of the internet which is something of a combination of the metaverse, blockchain, and open source -- and I have no idea what I just typed.   If Web 3 can put Google, Twitter, and Facebook out of business or re-do how we do e-commerce, I wanna see it first.

As for the debate on crypto....ever notice that "regulation" is needed when prices DECLINE but not when they GO UP !!???!! 

The investor who lost money should blame him or herself, not Elon Musk.  He just figured out NOW that crypto may be a Ponzi Scheme ?  

Musk's environment tweet must have been on the electricity used to mine BitCoin and other cryptos.  I believe he made it a while back....not aware of any recent 15% drop in prices.  

Actionable  ?  Criminal charges ?  For what....offering an opinion ?  People need to look in the mirror when they are separated from their money.